


breathe, fallen angel

by serenfire



Category: How to Get Away with Murder
Genre: Backstory I invented, Character Study, Let's talk about drug addiction kids, M/M, Second POV, lets all cry over Connor ok ok, mid-season finale continuum
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-09
Updated: 2014-12-09
Packaged: 2018-02-28 19:46:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2744807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/serenfire/pseuds/serenfire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Truly, the lengths to which you will go to regain salvation are infinite.</p>
            </blockquote>





	breathe, fallen angel

**Author's Note:**

> for the endless pain of Connor Walsh, coposted on my [tumblr](http://www.tylerjosephstoast.tumblr.com/post/104773147737/breathe-broken-angel)
> 
> @anyone I know irl: do not read thanks

The words stick to your throat, but you spit them out, cascading down cracked lips with ragged intakes of breath. 

You have a drug problem. 

It’s not true. It’s not true _any more_. 

You remember being 15 and high, floating and listless, another boarding student who could care less about society, Ziplocs of powder tucked under sheets and behind windows. 

You’re not a drug addict _any more_ , but the heart palpations in the hallway reminded you of coke lines before History class, when you never knew when _they_ would find out what was going on under their noses, when they would burn you down and send you home. 

The axe in your sweating grip, the ooze and crunch of tearing the body to pieces, the pain of looking into his soulless, dead eyes. Blood on your hands, on your hair, in your eyes, in your throat when you swallow. 

To regain control over your breathing, and then to let it all out when Oliver asked the simple, terrible question. 

You grit a grin at his pause. You know how act like a sober druggie, know how to stare at his shirt, not his eyes, _definitely_ not his mouth. 

You could have said: I killed a man. I dragged his body to the woods and I burned it to ash. 

You could have said: Sam Keating killed Lila Stangard. 

You could have said: I’m going to jail I’m going to jail They’ll lock me up in a cell for the rest of my life and I’ll never _see_ you again and None of this was meant to happen. 

You could have said: I’m so fucking sorry about everything. 

Instead you reached out with open arms, baring your soul the best you ever could, and the chopping block called. 

They want you on trial, in the same living room where you researched for days on end, sleeping spread out over couches, sharing in life with your teammates, your competitors, your partners in crime. _She_ wants you to gather, to testify, to string you up and spit you out on the other end of the law, and your feeble lie to Oliver is forever at a halt. 

You gather your jacket, hair still dripping from the shower. 

It’s morning on a Saturday, and the rings circling your eyes will not be noticeable for a few hours still, enough for you to fake smiles to the police and wonder when they’ll bring out the lie detector and strap you to it. 

The police are calm and collected, with a tape recorder and routine questions jotted down on a notepad. 

When was the last time you saw Samuel Keating. 

Did he give any indication of preparing to flee. 

Did you know he had a fight with his wife before he went missing. 

Where were you when it happened. 

You smile, you give honest answers if the memories of hours ago had been burned along with the flesh. The officers in uniform nod cordially, and they leave without snapping handcuffs on the four of you, without asking you if Sam killed Lila. 

The four of you reconvene after they leave, and everyone is breathing unsteadily. 

Not as bad as the shaking arms and jolting pain through your palms, the crooked snapping smile and the continuous laughter of a hopeless convict. 

Shared experiences make for shared lies and guilt, and from here you can smell the perfume applied copiously on everyone, washing off the scent of smoke and rot. 

It doesn’t work. It will never work. You dipped your hands in Sam’s blood and your nail beds are stained pink with desperation, with fear. 

Michaela’s calmer than before. “They don’t know,” she breathes. “They don’t even suspect. How can they not even _suspect_?” 

Laurel looks around the circle. “What are we going to do now?” 

“Go home,” Wes says. “Sleep. Enjoy your lives. There’s nothing else we _can_ do.” 

“My ring is still with the body,” Michaela repeats for not the last time. 

“If you can convince Aiden not to worry or suspect anything, you’ll be fine. We’re in the home stretch here,” Wes says, attempting at comfort. 

And you look down at your hands, at the slow vibrations of delayed shock, screaming in sign language the time that will always be at the forefront of your dreams. You can’t go to sleep, can’t ingest any pills, can’t bring up the nerve to call Oliver back. 

There’s no going back from being a broken mess in front of your ex, for reasons more illegal than mixing unknown pills while a football riot plays in sync outside your window, in hope of — of forgetting, of falling back in step with the world, of being known and accepted, of what were you _thinking_ at 15 and alone. 

Aiden unraveled the harsh cocoon of guilt you’d strung over yourself, systematically and as easily as a breath of wind. You’d cried so many tears rolling rivulets down the cheeks and wrists of your veins in front of him, and entrusted so much to him a decade ago. 

To Oliver, the case had happened again — you had slipped, fallen down so very long into a deep pit of relentless abuse to seek something you could never have, a normal life with a dead man’s cries in your earlobes. Yet you _jumped_ at the chance to escape from him, to face the firing squad instead of the soft-spoken interrogation. 

You drive to a bar, the one across the street from the bank, tired and unable to fade to black, willing to forget. You don’t notice the people in the room with cocktail dresses and suits appropriate for a Saturday afternoon, and you’re on 50 hours without food but you don’t notice that either. 

Oliver’s sitting by a table by himself, on his phone, an empty glass in front of him, and every yarn of thought spins out of you at once. 

There is a door directly behind you, and you feel it with your heel. Turning and blundering out of this place is always a viable option, and always the easier way taken. You would never blame yourself if you hid in your apartment and never relived the tragedy of yesterday, especially not a lie spanning a decade along with it. 

But there is no physical way you can tear yourself away from the man, not when he’s sitting with a twitch in his spine and an exhausted droop to his eyes and is clearly agitated, waiting for someone. 

Waiting for _you_? 

It would be the first time. 

You knew your 16-year-old self collapsed into Aiden’s arms, and how it turned out now, outing him in order to not live in fear of the past. How it backfired as all revenge does, and you can’t look Michaela in the face any more. 

But it is impossible for you to look down at your nails, still stained with blood, and there is thus no other choice. 

You slip into the chair across from where Oliver is lost in minutia, and wait for him to notice you. 

You’re studying the decoration of the tabletop when he breathes, “Connor?” 

“I came back,” you say, stretching out a hand, palm up, to show him. _Look, his blood. Can’t you see it? It never stops dripping._

Oliver takes your hand in his, and you flick your gaze to his face. He doesn’t (won’t) notice the blood. 

“You ready to talk?” he asks. 

You shrug, and grin, “I do have a free day today, as I wasn’t arrested.” 

“Right,” Oliver blinks. 

You grab his hand back, and your grin doesn’t dissipate. 

Truly, the lengths to which you will go to regain salvation are infinite. 


End file.
